Numerous techniques have been developed for controlling playback of media content such as live or recorded television, digital versatile disks (DVDs), etc. However, many existing techniques have one or more shortcomings. For example, by using various “transport keys” (also referred to as “trick play” keys) on a remote control a user can seek to another location in media content. As particular examples, a user can fast forward to seek another location in recorded TV or rewind to go back to a previous location in live TV if the live TV signal is buffered. Another technique is to allow the user to skip ahead a pre-determined amount of time each time the user presses a “skip” button. However, this is a guessing game of trial and error and results in many button presses. For example, if a user is watching a recorded TV show when commercials start the user presses skip one or more time to attempt to skip the commercials. However, once all of the commercials have been skipped, the user will usually need to press replay to move back to be sure that no portion of the TV show was skipped.